- Listen to all of them, though the first one is the best, even if it gets the timing wrong.  (Hat tip: FMA).

- This is creative destruction in action.

- Don’t blame the ladies, there isn’t enough for anyone.

- Speaking of the ladies, the one over there makes ours look like intellectuals.  (Hat tip: NM).

- Tales of the original Major Zia — an amazingly well researched post on the Liberation War as it was fought (and not as re-imagined years later).

- Everything you wanted to know about the murdering BSF but was afraid to ask.

These posts will contain inappropriate language, rampant racism/sexism/age-ism, random references to things good Bangladeshi boys and girls are not supposed to know about until one day they get married and magically become experts. — DS

Part One.  Part two.

It is December 2011 and there is an hour till midnight. Dr Gonjo and I have finished our cigarettes. The crowd is much larger than we were expecting.

DS: Accha, ekta Monty Python style youtube video kortey hoibo Cox’s Bazarer jonyo. Dui jon loke, punjabi, shaal pora. Aastey aastey hetey jacchey beacher paasher raasta ta diye. Dekhtesey amader moto manush concert e jaachey, raat 11tar shomoy Cox’s Bazar er raastaay Moghbajarer traffic jam. Ekjon arek joner dikey takabey. Kichu khon chup thaakbey. Music baajbey – shanai! Tarpor ekjon arekjon ke bolbey, khub khaati Banglay, “Jaygata ar nirob thaaklo na.”

DG (laughs): Eito, eitarey boley filler DS. Kisu bolar nai, kowar nai, tai pechaal mara. Non-stop. Tui kintu chup thaaktey parosh na. Tobey idea ta kharap na.

DS: Arey dhur miya. My bullshitting skill is my livelihood.

But it’s true. Cox’s Bazar wasn’t like this when I visited 5 years back. A lot more people seem to be having a lot more fun this time.

I look at the crowd. It is mostly male, as it has been since we arrived at Cox’s Bazar. It is very definitely not the kind of place where I would find many of my EMS school mates.

(Or for that matter many of Chikna’s BMS ones either. Chikna went to an elite Bangla medium school. Even among the Bangla medium kids, there are some more equal than others. The only time they rally together is to eviscerate “my kind”.)

No. The crowd was mostly people who either lived in Cox’s Bazar — y’know, what the Dhakaites would call provincial, mofoshshol-marka. Or they had come to Cox’s Bazar on holiday, not KL, Pattaya or Nazimgarh where all the “proper people” go these days.

And once they were in Cox’s Bazar, they were not staying at the Seagull or Long Beach as proper people do. (We weren’t, even though Gonjo is very proper.) Both of those are lovely hotels I’m sure. And they did provide their own entertainment for (Gregorian) New Year’s Eve. One of them even had a DJ Hardi(c)k. No joke.

Ayub Bacchu is announced by a lady who speaks English with an unfortunate accent. Nevertheless it is Gregorian New Years, and English is compulsory on all Bangla channels. She means to tell us to keep enjoying the “beachfest”, but ends up asking us to enjoy the “bitchfest”. This brings Dr Gonjo out of his own reverie and he pipes up. He has been fretting these last couple of days over the lack of women in general.

Dr Gonjo: “Bitchfest” na, “bitchfest” na. Pura sausage-fest!

Several people in the crowd laugh. Maybe How-I-Met-Your-Mother fans, maybe not. Dr Gonjo then starts singing “Tiger Tiger” because Ayub’s AB’s name has been mentioned.

The crowd is boisterous. Later I would hear that around 150,000 people were there on the beach that night. Lots of people lighting up flares around us and waving them over their heads. Some of the guys have started a non-hip swaying, high energy conga line. People are having fun. More people than I ever expected. It might be a sausage fest, but Dr Gonjo is getting into the spirit of things. Some people even take up the refrain of “Tiger Tiger”. I try not to think of William Blake or the Bangladesh cricket team.

Instead I catch sight of a flag in the distance. The sponsors of the concert.

Airtel.

India.

Bess. Gesey.

I think to myself. Eita niye blog e lekhlei hoilo. The anti-India crowd will tear me a new one as India’r dalal.

I realise at that moment that I am definitely going to write about this. And throw more fuel on the fire.

(To be continued…)

These posts will contain inappropriate language, rampant racism/sexism/age-ism, random references to things good Bangladeshi boys and girls are not supposed to know about until one day they get married and magically become experts.  — DS

It is 2005 and I am at university. New continent, new country, new friends, new music. On those faraway shores for the first time I hear Gari chole na, Bioscope and Chader Shohorey. It’s also the first time I have good friends from Bangla-medium schools. Because over there, away from Dhaka’s status games, we are all Bangladeshi first.

Chikna is one of those friends.

So is Guitarman.

Standing there on the beach at Cox’s Bazar on 31 December 2011, I remembered both fondly. But I also remembered how awkward it was with Chikna during the first couple of years. He would tend to make snide remarks about English-medium students or “Dhaka’s elite” every chance he got. Guitarman was too much of a gentleman to ever join in.

I think Chikna finally warmed up to me the day I told him I actually listened to and liked Dolchhut. We had previously discussed the Bangla music scene quite a bit. It was hard not to in, Guitarman’s presence. But I think he had stuck talking to the usual suspects in my presence — Bangla, Cryptic Fate, Watson Brothers etc — all good English medium-sanctioned choices back then.

I remember to this day the expression on his face. What I had mentioned casually had come to him as a revelation. He stayed silent for a moment and then said simply, “I didn’t think you’d like them.”

I never asked him why not. I guess I implicitly understood that Dolchhut was to him some sort of marker of authenticity. Most of us have one: eating rice with one’s hands, lungis, prayer, puffing the magic dragon, whathaveyou. Something that makes you one of us rather than one of them.

Chikna treated me differently from that day on. The jibes stopped gradually. I often wondered what select club I had been admitted to through my fondness for Dolchhut. Did he finally recognise me as a kindred soul from middle Dhaka (middle by income, middle by geography, amra moddhyomoni! Hat tali!) rather than as some aberration who just happened to grow up near Farmgate?

If that was the case, then he was mistaken. But not any more so than others had been and would be over the years…

For instance, Chikna just got married this winter. To a beautiful Bangladeshi girl he met in that cold country where we had also met, and where he now lives. Myself? I am no closer to marrying the ideal Bangladeshi girl as I approach the big three-oh and the bathetic tales of my failed romance(s?) would earn me 10 years in jail or a $6000 fine at the least.

Yes, at the least.

I decided long ago not to stay in a pigeon-hole once I was put into it. As anything, good or bad. Middle class, elite, poor, immigrant, patriarchal, EMS, brown, Muslim, drunk, Marley-fan, Bogart-wannabe, khait, FOB, westoxified, liberal, mullah, young, old, marriage material, “hai hai, oi cheley? hajar bochoreo na“. Yes, I have heard all of those. Perhaps that is why I get along with Dr Gonjo.

It’s understandable to be honest. Labels help us navigate the complexity of the social ecology by simplifying it. Or as the Clooney character says in Up in the Air, “I stereotype. Like my mother. Makes life easier.” Can’t argue against a man’s mother’s advice.

The nomadism helps with ditching labels (unless the label you’re looking for is “like George Clooney’s character in Up in the Air, except less handchum of course”).

But it hasn’t been easy.

Especially when I’ve been in Dhaka.

(To be continued…)

I’ve played host to Desi friends in the past.  I had taken them to the historically relevant places in and around Dhaka — Lalbagh Fort and Ahsan Manzil, Shaheed Minar and the National Memmorial, Dhaka University and Ramna, Liberation War Museum and Dhanmondi 32.  I had taken them to the eateries — Nirob Hotel and New Market, Star and Razzaque.  I had even bought them Economist from the footpath.

Had they stayed longer, I’d probably recommend them Sylhet, Chittagong Hills, and the Sunderbans.

And I would try to organise a crossing of the Padma or Jamuna during a full moon.

But what about if I was advising a Firangi friend?  Why would any westerner want to go to Bangladesh?

Here is the official version:

But I am not sure if Firangi tourists really care about this stuff.  So there is a long beach.  Big deal.  There is nothing to do in Cox’s Bazaar!  There is the Sunderbans, but you can get a better experience in West Bengal — trust me, I’ve been two both sides.  Lalbagh Fort or Paharpur or old mosques – India and Pakistan have better preserved, more famous, older ruins.  As for the more recent history, Desis (from either India or Pakistan) may have personal attachments, but why would the average westerner care about how brown men killed other brown men and women brutally?

Kristin Boekhoff nails it, and also provides a solution.  (Hat tip: Obaidul H).

When I first started talking about my project, most people didn’t get it. They wondered why I wasn’t developing in Cox’s Bazar and couldn’t believe that I wasn’t going to put televisions in my rooms. The idea of creating a quiet place by a river where families could go, relax, reflect, and enjoy each other’s company was as foreign as I was. At the time the posters advertising tourism in Bangladesh were covered with photos of the Jamuna

Bridge. Everyone was talking about ‘the world’s longest sea beach’ without realizing that the while the beach in Cox’s Bazar may be the biggest, it is not the prettiest, nor is it attractive to foreigners who would prefer to spend their holidays taking photographs instead of being photographed themselves. I went to meetings with government officials and potential investors and tried to explain that the real draw of Bangladesh to a foreigner isn’t its beach or its few small archaeological sites, but the fact that it is the world’s largest river delta and that the people who have built homes and families on the banks of these byzantine waterways are some of the most naturally hospitable people in the world. In Bangladesh a foreigner can still have an authentic travel experience because the people here are authentic. They still live in mud homes, use water buffalo to plant their fields, and grind spices by hand.

Fortunately, in the past five years more Bangladeshis have realized the potential of the natural beauty of their country and the value of relaxation. As the traffic in Dhaka has gotten worse, the demand for yoga classes, spas, and nature hikes have increased. Several new eco-resorts are under development and many non-profit organizations have been created to protect the country’s natural heritage.

The pastoral countryside will ultimately be a draw for foreign visitors, but Bangladesh’s first tourist market will be the people who already live here, primarily the burgeoning middle-class. These educated people of increasing means are also seeking safe, clean places to take their families. While trips abroad are attractive to them, higher costs, difficulties in obtaining visas, and a desire to give their city-born children a ‘gramer bari’ (‘village home’) experience will make local destinations attractive to them.

Though my target market is affluent travellers, they too will primarily be Bangladeshis and the expatriates who live in Dhaka. I have seen grown Bangladeshi men in business suits strip down to lungis and jump in my river. There is something about returning to the countryside that restores the joy of youth and the excitement of discovery. Complex problems and technological distractions fade away and are replaced by the simple pleasures of evening boat rides, great conversation, and the amazement of spotting a rare butterfly. While the city of Dhaka is harsh and chaotic with the sights, sounds, and smells of a developing industrial city, Bangladesh’s countryside is a tropical haven that even many of the native city-dwellers have forgotten about.

Indeed.

And I suspect that if this idea takes off, we will see many East Asian tourists visiting rice fields that their own countries had no so long ago.

Meanwhile, for my next trip home, it will be the book shops of New Market that will do the trick.

These posts will contain inappropriate language, rampant racism/sexism/age-ism, random references to things good Bangladeshi boys and girls are not supposed to know about until one day they get married and magically become experts.  — DS

In other words, this is not family friendly, not politically correct, and is bound to offend someone. It might not even be accurate or honest in any way, which is its own crime.

Oh, and it’s long. Really long. Longer than an MP’s praises for the “greatest man in our history” and his daughter/wife.  It has been split into several parts.

Names have been altered to protect the identities of the participants because the events depicted herein do not do credit to any parties involved. Read on at your own risk.

Hushiar.

It is December 31, 2011, and Dr Gonjo and I are walking through the jhaubon towards the beach. Beams of lights stream through the trees, sometimes carving out moving silhouettes of fellow travellers, sometimes illuminating the wafting smoke. Our noses twitch at the smell of tobacco mixed with other, contraband herbs.

Dr Gonjo sighs. Gone are the days when he was a ready source of roll-ups that Snoop Dogg would have preferred. He simply clutches the bottle inside his jacket closer to his chest.

DG: Bura hoiya gelam.

DS: Shetai. Amader oi din paar hoye gesey.

I myself haven’t indulged for years now. At one point, I thought this might strain my friendship with Dr Gonjo. But Gonjo’s a few good men rolled into one, and does not let trivialities like that stand in the way of a good time. He has acquired a bottle for me too.

DG: Eto manush hobe bhaabi nai.

We had come to Cox’s Bazar the day before with vague plans. We had come at my insistence, to help me preserve a record. The previous six (Gregorian! Ah ha, bollam to Gregorian!) new year’s eve had been spent in six different cities, across three continents. I wanted a seventh city for the seventh year.

Cox’s Bazar seemed just right. Not too far from Dhaka, where amidst the Idur Dour, I have a loving family. The ocean, the stars, the drinks, Dr Gonjo’s company and his guitar would make for an ideal new years’ celebration. That was as clear as the plan got.

Then my mother calls around 7 in the evening. There’s a concert on the beach, she says. It’s being shown live on Desh TV.

My mother is a lovely woman. She watches Bangladeshi channels, prays five times a day and never sees the devil inside Dr Gonjo. Or me. She would be mortified if she knew how I had spent this day over the past six years.

But she doesn’t.

Instead, she sanctioned my wanderlust in a conversation we had three years ago, making this Bangali momma’s boy feel less guilty for constantly running away from home.

I tell her I’ll go check out the concert and get back to my hotel room by 10:30. What I don’t tell her is that I will then help Dr Gonjo carry 3 bottles of coloured water back to the concert so we can toast the new (Gregorian) year at midnight.

Dr Gonjo interrupts my reverie as we find a place to stand. Souls is performing Nisshongota, easily the best song they have. A hundred thousand voices sing along to it, without being aware of the irony.

Maybe there is no irony. People sometimes feel more alone in large numbers.

DG: I hate crowds – but this isn’t as bad as I thought.

He lights up. Tobacco. I take out a Benson Light.

DS: It’s new year’s eve. Isn’t a crowd par for the course?

DG: Apni to bideshi babu. Apnar kachey to tai mone hobey. Apni to Times Square marka jinish prefer korbeni.

He’s joking of course. But I’m not going to let him get away with that.

DS: Ho. My love of crowds comes from my “Westoxification” *air quotes – a filthy habit* and not from having grown up in Dhaka…. And please. You know very well I’ve never been to New York.

Partho winds down and thanks the crowd. An hour to go before midnight. He starts another song I don’t recognise. (i.e., it’s not pothik, porichoy or chayer cup e). Ayub Bacchu is announced as the next act. I take another drag. I had quit cigarettes in 2011. But Dr Gonjo’s presence has had a Pavlovian effect on me.

DG: Dolchchut er ashar kotha na?

DS: Ha tai to shunsilam.

I answer him distractedly. Dolchut brings back memories of other places, very far from the ones Bappa Majumdar and Sanjeeb Chowdhury had sung about. It brings back memories of when I first listened to them, freezing my toes off amidst a snowy winter far up North. It brings back memories of awkwardness, and ultimately closure.

(To be continued…)

- This was much, much better than I expected.  (Why the French subtitle, you ask?  Because I read the story in French first).

- If the British and the Russians played the Great Game, what do India and China play?  Whatever it is, Nepal is a board.

- Americans really don’t care about anyone else.  And that’s a bad thing.

- Even Pakistanis aren’t buying Bose’s rubbish.  (Hat tip: Bon Bibi).

- Blogosphere Zindabad!

- Everything you wanted to know about Kala Pahar.  (And don’t worry if you never wanted to know about Kala Pahar — you are probably like everyone else who believe nothing before March 1971 matters).

- Hmmm.  You’d be brave to study this stuff.  But I think it’s cool that there are brave people around.  And yes, I do think it’s a book.

And yet, the discourse about Zia is dominated by lies of various degree.  Even his own political creation, Bangladesh Nationalist Party, doesn’t try to engage in a serious discussion about his synthesis.  In a modest attempt at rectifying this, I started a five-part series last May.  The first part covered politics and governance.  Over the fold is a discussion on various socioeconomic issues.  Future installments will cover sociocultural issues and the foreign policy, while the final post will point out how along one crucial dimension, the Zia synthesis has completely been abandoned.  Not in all aspects does this blog agree with the synthesis — the disapprovals are also pointed out.

Society and economy

In a series of recent articles and media appearances (one example is here), Amartya Sen has noted how Bangladesh has better social indicators than India despite having only half the per capita income.  This theme has been picked up by a number of 40th anniversary pieces that note that Bangladesh has done pretty well when it comes to human development, despite unfriendly nature and dysfunctional politics.  As it happens, the beginning of pretty much all the examples of ‘good results’ recorded by Bangladesh can be traced to the Zia era.

Take population control for example.  In the 1970s, population was growing by 3% a year, and was expected to double to 150 million by the mid-1990s.  That has been delayed by well over a decade, and population growth rate is now between 1-1.5%.  At the time of independence, Bangladeshi women on average had 7 children.  By 2008, according to the World Bank, fertility rate had fallen to 2.3 — close to replacement level that stabilises population.   Look at the chart — when do you see the beginning of the sustained dip in this rate?

And unlike in China or India, the decline in fertility rate hasn’t been accompanied by grotesque discrimination against female infants (effectively female infanticide in places).  In fact, on metrics related to living standards of poor women, Bangladesh tend to pretty well compared with its peers.

The reason for this includes concerted government efforts — something again initiated by the Zia regime, and continued by everyone since.  But activities of the NGOs and the emergence of the ready made garment sector have also played their part.  Of course, both the first Aarong shop and Desh Garments (first RMG factory) started when Zia was the president.

What about self sufficiency in food?  The green revolution came to Bangladesh under Zia.

What about the remittance boom that has kept Bangladesh afloat for the past decade?  The Gulf labour market opened under Zia.

We can see a pattern here.  But let’s not belabour the point.  Instead, let’s ask — how much of this was because of conscious decisions by Zia?  How much of this would have happened anyway under Mujib had he lived?  Was Zia simply lucky?

After all, it’s not like Mujib was unaware of the importance of population control, or food security, or women’s empowerment.  And he tried to establish relations with the Arab countries.  The thing is, Mujib’s efforts failed, while Zia succeeded in initiating or establishing the processes that led to the achievements we celebrate today.  The question then becomes, why Zia and not Mujib?

The standard answer to this question is that Mujib had to deal with a war ravaged country while Zia came in when the hard task of reconstruction was done.  But this standard story is only half true, and therefore all wrong.  Yes, Mujib had a war ravaged country.  But the country had hardly been reconstructed when Zia assumed power.  If anything, after the 1974 famine and the impacts of Bakshal and the coups of 1975, Bangladesh was in a more perilous condition when Zia assumed power.

I would contend that Zia succeeded not because his task was easier, but because he was a pragmatic technocrat who eschewed ideology and grandiosity, and adopted ‘whatever works’.  Thus, for example, he facilitated the NGOs to expand not because there was an ideological dispensation for it, but because he recognised that these agencies were providing a service that the state machinery was incapable of delivering.

I will talk about foreign policy in a later post.  For now, it’s important to note that Zia received political as well as economic support from the Red China right from the beginning.  And China itself was undergoing its transition from the Mao to Deng era at the time Zia emerged in Bangladesh.  From all accounts, Zia’s pragmatism seems to be heavily influenced by Deng Xiaoping’s philosophy of ‘crossing the river by feeling the stones’.

This is not to say that Zia was ‘ideology free opportunist’.  Far from it.  The opportunist thing to do would have been to talk about socialism while encouraging crony capitalism — exactly how things are in today’s Bangladesh.  But Zia consciously and deliberately turned away from socialism.

Think about how radical this would have been in the late 1970s.  This was before the Reagan-Thatcher ascendancy, before the reform eras of China and India, before Glasnost and Perestroika.  Soviet Union was still exporting revolution, as was Red China.  Indeed, Zia himself was put to power by radical soldiers claiming to carry out a ‘people’s revolution’.  The opportunist thing to do would have been for Zia to dub himself the great socialist.

Instead, what Zia claimed to base his economic policies was ‘social justice’ – সামাজিক ন্যায়বিচার in Bangla.  Now, social justice has never actually been defined formally.  But we can guess what he would have meant by this from the policies and developments adopted and initiated under his watch.

I would contend that social justice would involve economic growth, which translated into jobs and income from the rural and urban poor and less affluent classes.  I would contend that social justice would mean stable prices and macroeconomic stability.  I would contend that social justice would mean government programmes that ensure safety nets such as food vouchers for the needy.  Social justice, I would suggest, would involve active government programmes for human development, and particularly development of the marginalised sections of the society.

Social justice, I would contend, is what Sen says Bangladesh is better at than India.

Interestingly, across the Muslim world, parties that are coming to power with popular mandate seems to contain ‘social justice’ or related terms such as welfare or development in their names.  It seems that Ziaur Rahman pioneered a synthesis that is still all too relevant not just in Bangladesh, but in other similar countries too.

What does this slowdown mean for Bangladesh?

Not much, directly, as far as the production side of the economy is concerned.  After all, as Bangladeshis never tire of pointing out, Indians don’t buy Bangladesh stuff.  With about 2% of its export going to India, any slowdown there isn’t likely to matter much for Bangladeshi producers.

But there might be good news for the households.  Food prices in India are on the wane.  That’s likely to affect prices in Bangladesh.  Further, as the rupee falls against taka, inflationary pressures should ease.  In fact, rupee had already fallen by over 10 paisa against taka between July and November.  This was accompanied by food price inflation in Bangladesh easing to 10.4% in the year to December, compared with 13.4% in the year to July.  Rice price isn’t likely to fall to 10 taka a kg, but if the rupee falls further, there will be some respite on the prices front (assuming, of course, all else equal — which might not be the case thanks to Messrs Muhith and Ataur Rahman).

There is, however, another channel through which Bangladesh might be affected.  What if the slowdown proves sharper and more prolonged than currently believed?  What if India has a hard landing?  There is no statistics, official or otherwise, about the undocumented Bangladeshis working in India.  But there is no question that if the Indian economy seriously falters, it will have an impact on these folks.  Perhaps the result will be a return of the monga?

- The title says Dawkins ‘tears her’.  But I thought Dipu Moni did alright.  (Hat tip: Diganta S).

- Pirates of Chittagong.

- This is Bangladesh.  And I like it.  (Hat tip: UR).

- They are printing money.  This was, of course, predicted.  Even Khandaker Ibrahim Khaled admits that the Bangladesh Bank has a poor governor.  Too bad he didn’t speak up 30 months ago.

- Don’t do it!

(Hat tip for the video: NM)

- Remember all the hoopla about DST?  For the record, I thought it was a good idea.  Anyhoo, turns out Samoans have even more fun.  In fact, when it comes to time, good ol’ US of A is also knee deep in socialism!

- This was strangely better than what I expected, but don’t expect a post on it.

thor

Ah well, instead of asking ‘why no one is talking about 1/11′, over the fold I am going to note my thoughts (as they stand currently — incomplete, tentative, open to revisison) on what led to 1/11, and what might still happen.

The golden rule of Bangladeshi politics is that thou must not lose power.  If you lose, bad things happen.  Not only do you have no perks of the office, you lose all sources of income — legitimate or otherwise, you lose your home, and sometimes you lose your life.  So, the incumbent does everything it can to cling on to power.  They try to rig the election outright.  If that doesn’t work — and it is hard to do if you are unpopular — they want to make sure that the opposition doesn’t participate.  If one-sided elections don’t work — and they didn’t in Feb 1996 — they want to make sure that the opposition is handicapped as much as possible.  They want to pack the Election Commission with hacks, rig the voting list, or introduce EVMs, or keep the mobile networks switched off, or perform any other trick that might give them an edge.

This was true in late 2006.  I think this will still be true in late 2013.  Forget about the EVM or partisan EC.  The Prime Minister will not step down from the office before the election.  She will campaign with the full might of the state — if nothing else, this will tilt the field in her favour.

Of course, the opposition is aware of all this.  But what can they do?

Well, there is another rule in Deshi politics — the incumbent always loses.  No government in our history has remained popular enough to win a re-election after five years in power (yes, I am aware that Sattar won a handsome victory after Zia’s death, but the BNP government was less than three years old).  It’s hard to remain popular if you are in charge of tens of millions of poor people packed in 150,000 square km of land.   The opposition should win a free and fair election quite comfortably. If there is a free and fair election, simply showing up would be enough.  They didn’t do polls back in 2006, but I think even the die hard BNPwallahs would admit that a free election in late 2006 would have brought AL to power.  And as a number of local government elections and opinion polls confirm, BNP is on course to win a victory if there is an election held now.

But how do you get a free and fair election if the incumbent is set to rig?

You neutralise the instruments of rigging.  You put up a credible show of power to drive fear into the hearts of the school teachers and junior government officers and policemen who are supposed to rig the election for the other side.  You hold the businessmen to ransom by shutting down the ports and highways.  You convince the senior bureaucracy and the army that it’s time to ditch the other side.  And you convince the opinionmakers — the editors and think tankwallahs and talking heads (and bloggers) — that they really ought to support your cause.

How do you do this?  You have an andolon.  The tactics of the andolon changes.  In the 1990s, there was lagatar hartal.  In the 2000s, there was logi-boitha.  Now there are road marches.  But the point remains the same.  Massive show of force that neutralises the instruments of rigging.  And this is best achieved if you can have a ‘victory’ before the election.

The biggest opposition win came in 1996 — AL forced the then PM’s resignation, wins don’t come any bigger than that.  Even the most hardcore anti-AL-er election officer would think three times before trying to do anything dodgy ater a win like that.  In 2001, there wasn’t any big, visible victory for BNP before the election.  But the caretaker administration of Latifur Rahman, with the support of President Shahabuddin, the Election Commission (packed with AL-ers) and the army (headed by Lt Gen Harun — very much associated with AL in his retired capacity), sent out a strong signal to the local administration within hours of taking office.  Result was that, if anything, pre-election violence and intimidation hurt AL.

Come 2006, the fear of losing was higher for BNP than any of its predecessors.  Therefore, the mechanisms for rigging were more elaborate.  And consequently, AL needed a bigger victory than ever before.  What could be a bigger victory than 1996?  Prevent the election from taking place, of course.

AL was never going to participate on 22 January 2007.  This is not to say the election on that day would have been fair.  BNP didn’t want a free and fair election then for the same reason that no incumbent wants a free election in Bangladesh.   Had AL participated, could they have prevented BNP from stealing the election?  Perhaps.  Maybe the popular revulsion against BNP was so strong that AL would have won even a heavily rigged election.  But AL didn’t want to take that risk.  It wanted a bigger victory than 1996.

So AL kept changing its demands — KM Hassan can’t be the CA, Aziz must leave the EC, all the other Commissioners must go, bureaucrats in EC must go, Ershad must be allowed to run.  When they submitted their nomination papers in late 2006, Grand Alliance partners and LDP and Islamists were given generous concessions — hell, even Nurul Islam Nahid didn’t get the nod, which went to some guy from Khilafat Majlish.  This was also the time of the infamous Fatwa Pact.  In the most brilliant political maneuvering of our time, Hasina gave everyone what they wanted for only one condition — if she doesn’t participate, no one participates.  And no one did.

BNP for its part thought that it could pull off a 1996-style election — it had completely purged any would MK Alamgirs from the bureaucracy by then.   So it wasn’t too concerned about AL not participating.  But BNP didn’t realise that not only had it lost popular support (everyone loses that), it had also lost elite support.  And the elite had had enough by the first week of January — hence 1/11.  Whether Masud dyed his hair thinking about his in-laws or Moeen scratched his bald head worrying about the implications for UN gigs — these are trivialities.  Army, and the civil bureaucracy, and the NGO sector, and the corporates, and the media, and the foreigners (except for the last, there is a huge overlap among all of them), simply didn’t want to see BNP — specifically Tarique Rahman — back,  That’s the main story, everything else is just details.

Of course, having taken power, the generals and their backers didn’t want to give it up.  After all, had the coup failed, Moeen and Masud would be in big trouble.  Having taken the risk, they wanted the reward.  What happened between 1/11 and the election that brought AL to power was really a negotiation about who gets what.  And happily, Sheikh Hasina snookered everyone else and won it all.

And now, AL fears losing even more than what BNP did in 2006.  And Hasina is aware of the elite shenanigans.  And Khaleda Zia has to have a bigger victory than anything Hasina had.

How does this end?

I don’t know.  But just like Godfather II or Dark Knight or Episode IV, I suspect 2/11 will be bigger, badder, louder than the last time.

Better get your jhal muri and gorom cha for the show.